That night I slept alone with Jazzy's head on my tummy. I was so determined to not cry, to bottle up the emotions slowly bubbling up to the surface.

Who was I kidding, believing Zabdi even for a second? Ilyaas was not going to change his mind and I had to live with that; the life of unhappiness he has condemned me to.

I snorted at myself. I was already condemned to that when Upapa died, or maybe even earlier than that.

I bit my lip to keep the sobs from making any sound. From what I could hear, I was sure Zabdi was outside my door. He was trying to be silent, but I recognized his breathing. He eventually decided against knocking and left.

Setting him free was the last act of love I would let him have of me. I just wished he would have had the same level of love for me to do the same. But no, he had to try to dictate who I'd marry. As if pointing in a direction away from him wasn't enough, he wanted to push me to the direction of someone he liked for me.

Did he have no mercy for me at all? Didn't he know that every day he tried choosing the right man for me was a daily reminder of him not choosing me?

I had no one else. No one.

I refused to believe anyone else would be able to accept me as he always had. No one had seen so much of me and stayed.

But it was my fault, wasn't it? I redefined his acts of kindness as acts of desire... maybe the image of him I had in my mind was nothing more than a figment of my lonely imagination.

And I clung to each tiny piece of him he gave me like a lifeline.

Who cared about the scars on my back? Ilyaas hugged me, nevertheless. Who cared about what they said about my hair? Ilyaas kissed my head despite it. Who cared about the dark places my mind went? Ilyaas only ever saw me in the light.

But at the end of the day... who cared? Even he didn't.

To him, we still lived in a world where convention mattered so much more than emotions. Or maybe, to him, there was none. Maybe it was just me. Maybe it was just me and the desperate need to be loved that fooled me into thinking he loved me at all.

No one loved me. Not even him.

How unfair it was... running away from loving him was like running in a circle. Every step away was a step towards.

Jazzy brushed against my chest, chuffing.

So, this was a broken heart. Pitiful. Lamentable. I had other, greater things to fail at. This was a mere inconvenience.

I wished I had the strength to pick up the shards of that damned heart and stab him with it. But even picking them up would cut me first before it cut him.

He didn't care if it cut me.

And so, I cried into the soft fur of my only companion, awaiting the sun to rise in New India, where I would spend a day trying to replace the only person I'd ever loved.

×+×

I was dressed in an anarkali when I descended from the train, wrapped in the starkest white, embellished in Kashmir sapphires and gold.

Out of all the people who barely knew me, Adee knew me enough not to send me rubies at least. I didn't want to keep lugging around a piece of fabric around my shoulders so instead if the expected saree, I was handsfree.

Still, it was heavy around my shoulders, the jewels adorning my head almost forcing me to bow. I kept my head up though, finding a balance, welcoming the sun and fog.

The elation of every soul who saw me was a thunderous cheer. They waved flags, they shouted from tiers of balconies, their joy gave me enough strength to perform my duties with a calm, albeit forced, smile. Petals rained down on me from the curtain-less windows above, and I inclined my head to them as thanks.

Ilyaas didn't want me, but these people needed me. There were far greater things to be concerned about than a boy and his misguided feelings.

I was wrong to want him, but he was wrong not to want me. And between the both of us, I gained more by losing him. Those were the lies I needed to hear from myself.

My eyes locked on to Adee the moment my feet touched the stairs leading to the stage. He smiled at me, and I felt then that I had an ally in the crowd. I gave him a wink down the line of dignitaries I had to shake hands with. Minister, minister, king, queen, prince...

In spite of the puffy eyes the makeup artist had to remedy, I knew I looked stunning. It was the first time I asked to look beautiful. I already was, but if there was anything to improve upon, it was perfection... Especially after a broken heart.

They shook my hand, bowed and kissed just as protocol asked. Ilyaas was right behind me through it all, covering my six without shading me from the crowd that waited days to see me. I didn't give him one word.

"I'm sorry." He said, as I took to the podium. I just looked at him with a blank stare. Forgiveness would come, but not on swift wings.

This is what he wanted. He wanted nothing.

"SEMPER INVICTA, NEW INDIA!" I declared in my most charismatic tone, and their screams, I absorbed into me. I decided then that it would be my meaning.

A husband was a needed object, an heir was a needed object, and both I could acquire. Love, on the other hand was an inconvenience, a bonus, a side dish.

If I found love in my lifetime, then it would be a blessing, but if I didn't, I no longer had the urge or need to pursue it.

The pursuit of such thing was like sailing for the horizon. With each inch gained towards, the goal inched away... And what was anyone but less than a feeble canoe? Sooner than later, there needed to be a concession; that the goal was never an object but an ideal only very few ever understood, much less obtained, and none ever kept.

Death comes for all of us.

I sighed. There were far greater things than love, and an empress was one of them.

×+×

The speeches were short, the tours were long. At least Adee was good conversation. He spoke on behalf of his minister and asked if I could help with labor and the overcrowding of the Stilts, an area full of houses on stilts littering the Mahim Bay.

"Better schools, and we're aiming for decentralization of work... We have more than enough engineers. We need farmers." Adee said as we sat at front row beside a stage where women were dancing an ornate dance.

"Do you have problems with land ownership?" I asked, remembering China.

"No, we have enough imperial land, it's just that the councils have predicted a food shortage in the next twenty years if we don't change our priorities." He said, leaning in with whispers. "We can always trade intra-border, but test runs showed we would negatively impact Eurasian markets."

"So, you want to move the people from the cities into the farmland."

He nodded. "Decentralization... but we don't want to force them out."

"So, we have to build homes and schools in the rural divisions to allow for that and... Well, I'll have to speak with the privy council, but I think it's a good idea to offer more scholarships for agricultural degrees." I said, remembering the provisions of the Reed Yan Project. "I'll also have a look at agrarian reform. Make it possible for them to own the land they work on in a few years?"

"Won't that lessen imperial hold?" He asked, concerned more for me than his people at that moment.

"The empire has enough." I said. "We have taxes and royalties... If you think this is good for your people, we can run simulations and we can make it happen." I said, furrowing my eyebrows. "We can decongest the cities by... Ten percent in the next five to seven years, and maybe that's enough to work on the farms since we can incorporate Japanese tech-"

He smiled at me, awed? "You're truly his sister."

Adee looked proud and reassured when he turned from me then. I found him speaking to his fiancée afterward, making sure to be photographed so as to not raise suspicions about us.

He was better at this than me.

I felt for him then. If only things were different, he might have ended up with my brother. And now, he was to be married to a woman he barely knew.

It was our duty. I felt a sense of solidarity there.

When we boarded a runner for Agra, he changed into a full-white garb and whispered, "Pretend he's here."

I appreciated the act. Less than a week before Kaz 'died' we visited Agra. It was my last good memory of him. And just like that visit, we ate at the Agra Fort amid the imposing yet ornately beautiful red sandstone.

Then I sat at the middle of the reflecting pool at the Taj Mahal, smiling at hundreds of photographers, and never felt more alone. I might as well have been the tomb inside it.

The heat was welcomed. I needed to feel alive. It was like eating yellow paint. And yet... I still felt empty.

You must learn to be still in the midst of activity and to be vibrantly alive in repose. Gandhi's voice sang in my head. But to my great ancestor I could only say, I've succeeded in the first but gloriously failed at the second. If it was possible, I was vibrantly dead.

So, when at that night I was given a few hours of rest after arriving in Mumbai again, I refused it and grabbed the first dinner invitation I could get my hands on. If I was left alone, I didn't know how I would feel.

Flipping through the notes sent to my room I found the invitation I wanted.

Tino. The best option. If I still was the girl, I was yesterday, I would have argued The one I marry must be my choice, not the best option among many. But hell... He was all I had. As much as it hurt me to agree with Ly, he was right about this.

It felt so wrong. If anyone deserved anything, it was Tino. Maybe I'd learn to love him eventually, or maybe he'd learn he didn't want me. For now, though, I needed him.

But there I was, on the floor, unready for a dinner date happening in twenty minutes.

"Jazzy?" I called out to her, lounging on my bed. "Give me a hug."

She cocked her head as if to say, "What's wrong?"

"Just come here..." And she did. I buried my face into the crook of her neck, and she leaned into me to accommodate. "I feel sad, Jazzy."

Her paw came to my face, almost bigger than my head, and she patted. She did this whenever she thought I needed it. Whenever I patted her on her head, I always praised her for being a good girl. Maybe this was her way of telling me I was one too.

"I'm good." I said.

She chuffed her agreement.

Then something glowed underneath my eyelids, in the lens over my left eye.

FOUND HIM & KILLER.

It was Raza.

×+×

I couldn't keep my knee from bouncing up and down. I asked Raza to send me Kaz's location, but he refused. He said he trusted no line now. He said he was being watched. And so, he arranged a meet-up at Dadar amidst the Stilts. No one would think to find me there.

I could barely breathe.

My mind screamed for Zabdi, and I told him to get a motorcycle and helmets ready for the eastern express highway. He screamed at me and asked for permission to wear the wig again. I gave him the finger in my head.

And then, again, the excitement and fear threatened to break the fragility of my sanity.

He was going to pick me up in thirty minutes, so the meal with Tino would have to be fast. The sky was full of stars as we stared into the night on one of the hidden balconies of the CST.

The conversation started with Varma's Damayanti, then his Shakuntala, until somehow, we reached the topic of the Hope Diamond, which was mined at the Krishna River, south-west and across the country from where we dined.

I was just telling him how the diamond was in a vault away from the House since it was considered cursed, and everything was going to plan until he placed the box on the table.

I gasped.

"That's a ten-carat sapphire ring." Only Ilyaas knew about that. My mind stopped racing... actually, it just stopped.

"Yes." He said, wiping the sweat from his hands on his white shorts. "I forgot to give you a coronation gift, so I got this shipped in." He babbled. "It was my mom's engagement ring-"

"Why are you doing this?" I blurted, my words seemingly cutting him, judging from his eyes. I was glaring at him, and I couldn't stop it.

My heart was heavy in my chest. I wanted so much to just look away and run for the mountains. I wanted to find Ilyaas and throw him off a window for doing this. This was not the time. How could Tino not see that?

"What?" The innocence in his voice broke me, but I had to be firm. I did not want this.

"You're trying to pressure me." I said. "Stop." I am not a person to be pressured. I quoted Gandhi in my head again. Although, she probably was more fearless than fearful when she said that.

"But I'm not-" He said. "I can't even propose to you if I wanted to-"

"This is all wrong." Another cut across his heart.

I looked away from him before I did anything worse.

A few seconds of silence lapsed, and I heard him close the ring box. He diverted his gaze, looking up into the night beyond the balcony, the wind whipping his locks. He stood from the table and walked a few paces, as if wanting to put as much distance as possible between me and him.

"Wrong... with us?"

"No..." I stood, but he took a step away for each one I took closer. "Everything... me... I'm nineteen!" My words were working against me. Why did he have to do this tonight? "You're supposed to be in college too, falling in love with some beautiful unproblematic girl-"

"You're saying I shouldn't fall in love with you?" His blue eyes bore through my haze. He had tears in them. All thought of being firm flew into the New Indian sky.

"I-"

"Well, that's a problem because I already have."

What do I say to that? "That's impossible, we've only seen each other a handful of times! And... I'm not good..." I looked down. I had to stop looking at his pain - the pain I caused.

"You are."

"I'm not good enough for you" I hated myself for the lines I gave. It was true, damn it, but he deserved more than that godforsaken line.

His hand came to my chin, pulling my gaze up. "You are. You are and more." I wished so much that he was right, but he wasn't.

"I can't." I shook my head.

When I finally met his gaze, his pain was replaced with a type understanding I was sure I was unworthy of. "What do you want me to do?" He asked so sincerely it almost broke me. "Should I leave?"

Panic. It was panic that I felt course through me. I was so desperate to stay away, so desperate to keep him close, for the tragedy he, and the happiness I, didn't deserve... But for what? So, I could reject him again? "Do you want to leave?"

"I don't." He gave me a reassuring smirk. I didn't deserve that either. "But staying is just as hard... Seeing you with everyone else..." We both knew who he meant.

"We both know why we're here."

"Yes, but knowing doesn't make it hurt less, doesn't it?"

"I've hurt you?" Stupid question. Of course, I have.

He smiled, and just like that the tension deflated. It was hard to fight someone so willing to lose.

"I'd rather be hurt by you than be happy with anyone and anything else, your imperial majesty." You're wrong.

Tino took a step back, placing the box on the table. Leaving me to decide in the silence of the night, my future, our future, and the future of the continent. "But... If you don't mind, I'll take my leave for the night..." He whispered.

I opened and closed my mouth. No sound.

"I should go." He looked down, ashamed of his feelings. "Because right know, I can't take seeing you walk away."

How could he say that and expect me to be okay seeing his back turn towards me, now unknowing when he'll ever turn, or even if his eyes can look at me the same way again? I couldn't lose him like Ilyaas.

"Tino, don't leave me."

It was selfish. It was a mistake.

But Ly knew what I wanted, and now through a golden prince, he has given me his reply. And so, with shaking hands I put the ring on my right hand. Just like how Theo burned me with silver when he put his ring on me, this would be a consideration, not an acceptance.

To keep Tino happy and yet free to flee. If I was right about all my suspicions, he would soon know what was best for us - severance. And by that time, I wished I would be brave enough to cut the line.

I didn't know if it would be patience or relief, I'd see in his eyes... maybe it would be just his kindness. All I knew is that I deserved none of it.

His ocean eyes lit up. His arms so willingly wrapping themselves around me, lifting me up into the air.

His laugh was splendid. I laughed with him. But when my feet finally reached the floor again, all the effort to make him happy seemed for naught.

There stood Zabdiel, holding two helmets. "Let's go."